Category: typography

Typography is an important and crucial part of promotional material and advertising campaigns. Designers usually use typography to set a theme and mood in an advertisement (Felton, 2013). The latest trend in print advertisements is to use bigger fonts that grab the attention of the viewers (Graham, 2014). However, designers use different type of fonts and color based on the core message of the ad.

Wendy’s Strawberry Frosty Shake:

Wendy’s used typography very effectively in this ad. It used texts to make a glass of strawberry milk shake. The typography describes unique features of the product, which made the ad very informative. The designer made a hierarchy changing the size of the fonts in each level. Therefore, the design looks unified and balanced. Nevertheless, writing the slogan using a different font underneath the product’s name made the typography more eye-catching and effective.

As we know, Wendy’s is one of the major competitors of Burger King. Burger King also introduced various flavored milkshake in 2012. The target market for these milkshakes is young adults, particularly student.

Starbucks Coffee:

Although, Starbucks is not a direct competitor of Burger King, they do compete in a different field. The target audience for both the brand is same, which is the young adult market. Also, Burger King offers the Roast Coffee, which is a popular product of Starbucks.

Starbucks released this ad mainly to attack the restaurants that offer inexpensive coffees. Burger King is one of those restaurants. However, the ad itself is very effective. The main message of the ad was to deliver the brand value of Starbucks, which can be clearly understood by the texts. The texts are in order and create a visual hierarchy. The designer used ‘fact’ strategy in this ad by using a factual statement. He also put emphasis on the words ‘beware’ and ‘price’ using biggest and darkest fonts.

KFC Zombie Poster:

KFC is one of the local and international competitors of Burger King. It offers almost the same menu that Burger King offers. Both of the brands also target the same segment of the market, which is the young adults.

However, this ad was a poster made by KFC during the Halloween season of 2013. The poster only has the texts that are the brand slogan of KFC. The typography is very clear and eye-catching. The designer used bold fonts to put emphasis on the phrase “finger licking.” The font used to write the headline is from the ‘sans-serif’ group. The contrast colors, such as, white, red, black, and maroon, used in the design helped the most important phrase to stand out.

McDonalds- You just can’t resist it:

McDonalds is the main competitor of Burger King. They offer similar types of products and services. They target the same market, which is the young adult segment. McDolands is the direct international competitor of Burger King as well.

However, the ad here is very simple, yet expressive. It has its own tone and forms, that make this a successful ad (Felton, 2013). The core message of the ad is to communicate the unique features of the brand McDonalds. The designer only used some texts to achieve the goal of this ad. Making the logo and the slogan with all those action words made the ad more effective. Also, the designer created a visual hierarchy in this ad that makes it visually appealing.

Epic Burger:

Epic Burger, which is a Chicago-based fast food restaurant, is a local competitor of Burger King. They also target the young adults who prefer to eat out on occasion. However, the unique selling proposition (USP) of Epic Burger is that they offer customized burger. Customers can add extra sides with their burgers without paying any extra bucks.

This ad was made to tell the customers that the only thing they need to bring in their restaurant is napkin. Customers need a lot of napkins to eat the burger with all the sauces provided by Epic Burger. This ad effectively delivers the message the brand wanted to communicate with its customers. Putting the texts inside the buns made the ad looked more attractive. The fonts and their size of the texts are appropriate as well. The designer emboldened the words that need emphasis on them. Nevertheless, one of the major USPs of Burger King is that they also offer the option of customizing the burgers.

It is image that attracts the viewers most, and that’s especially true on the Internet where the shift to visual optimization is playing an increasingly important role in the recent phenomenon of photo marketing (Felton, 2013). According to a research of 3M Corp (2014), “The human brain processes visual images 60,000 times faster than text.” Therefore, it has become mandatory for the advertising professionals to build image-based solutions for their campaigns. However, this week’s blog post will focus on the ads that are completely image-driven.

McDonalds Chicken Burger:

This print ad of McDonalds beautifully achieved its goal by using an image only. The designer put an image of a chicken wrapped up by McDonalds packaging. This ad was released to promote their new line of products, which is chicken burger. However, this ad was a part of McDonalds’ authenticity of the sources ad campaign. The designer used ‘fact’ strategy in this ad by using the figure of a chicken (Felton, 2013). The image clearly indicates that McDonalds is trying to promote its chicken burger. Also, the designer used contrast colors to put emphasis on the main content of the ad. The contrast colors white and orange made a perfect visual hierarchy as well.

McDonlads is the direct competitor of Burger King. Both of the brands target the same market segment that is young adults. Burger King also offers chicken sandwich that is made of white chicken. Also, Burger King was the first major fast food chain to introduce grilled chicken sandwich. They also launched a campaign named “cheat on beef” to promote their chicken burgers.

KFC Burger:

The ad here was released by KFC to promote their Zinger burger. The advertisements of KFC often encourages group-eating. This ad also encourages a viewer to eat in group. This image-based ad depicts the ‘happy-feeling’ among a crowd. The designer used ‘visual metaphor’ strategy in this ad very effectively. However, the metaphor used in this ad is not a pure one. The designer used fused metaphor in this ad. Felton (2013) explained, “Unlike pure metaphor, fused images help contextualize the selling argument, viewers don’t have to leap quite as far when part of what they’re looking at is what’s for sale.” The ad effectively established a situation that portrays the core selling argument of the product which is group-eating.

KFC is another major competitor of Burger King. As mentioned above, a very important product line of Burger King is their chicken sandwich, which competes with the zinger burger of KFC.

Domino’s Pizza Christmas Ad:

Although, Dominos does not compete with Burger King directly, it can still be considered as a competitor of BK. Dominos target the same market segment as Burger King, which is the young adult segment. Both of the companies are included in the American Quick Service Restaurant (QSR) industry.

The ad here was released by Domino’s Pizza during the Christmas holiday time. The image used in the ad clearly delivers the core message of the ad. The designer placed a slice of pizza in a way that it looks like a Christmas tree. He used fused metaphor very efficiently in this ad (Felton, 2013). Domino’s Pizza effectively achieved their holiday campaign’s goal by using the Christmas tree as a metaphor of their product during the holiday time.

Pizza Hut

The ad here was released by Pizza Hut to promote their New-Yorker pizza. The designer designed the upper side of a pizza in a way that it looks like the skyline of New York city. This one is a very good example of image-driven ad. The image itself is self-explanatory and the viewers will immediately understand what this ad is all about right after viewing it. In my opinion, the designer used a combination of ‘two-fer’ and ‘visual metaphor’ strategies. The metaphor used here is the ‘skyline’ that consists of the important buildings of New York. Since the design created a surprising connection between two dissimilar things to deliver the core message, the strategy can also be called two-fer (Felton, 2013).

Pizza hut is not a direct competitor of Burger King either. The products these brands offer are different. However, the target markets of these brands are same. BK and Pizza Hut targets the young adults who prefer to eat out on a regular basis. Both the companies are fast food chains and offer quick services.

Domino’s On The Go Ads:

Another brilliant image-based campaign created by Domino’s Pizza was their ‘on the go’ campaign, which was launched to promote their mobile app. Two of these ads are beautifully designed to deliver the main message of the campaign. The designer placed some pizza slices in two of the crowded points of a city that are park and street. He used ‘fact’ strategy in this ad by showing how customers can place their order on the go (Felton, 2013). The images used in the ads are very eye-catching as well. However, what made the ads more effective is the contrast colors the designer used to put highest emphasis on the pizza slices. It is apparent that the contrast colors made it possible for the slices to stand out in the ads.

As mentioned earlier, Domino’s Pizza is an indirect competitor of Burger King. The core product of Domino’s is pizza, whereas the core product of BK is burgers. However, both the brands compete in the international market of fast food industry. They both operate their business locally and internationally.

Graphic design is the combination of art and technology that uses design elements such as typography and images to convey information or create an effect (Bennett, 2006). It is a form of visual communication that mostly uses a visual element to communicate a message (AIGA, 1993). Graphic design enables a company to position its brand in consumers’ mind by giving it a face and visual presentation. Therefore, the role of graphic design is very significant in advertising.
The brand I have chosen to do my research on is ‘Burger King’. The similar brands to Burger King are McDonalds, Wendy’s, Jack in the Box, and In n Out.

McDonalds: Free WiFi Campaign

McDonalds published this ad when it started offering free WiFi in all its restaurants. The design of the ad is very simple and creative. The image used in the ad is very compelling as well. If the objective of the brand is to communicate an important information, it is essential to use the image that is visually appealing and informative (Graham, 2002). The McDonalds box that has been placed like a laptop is self-explanatory and conveys the core message of the ad. It also evokes the viewer’s curiosity, which makes it an effective ad (Graham, 2002). The design of the ad is unified and gave appropriate emphasis on the content.

The ad that was published by Burger King after they introduced WiFi was not a creative one. It has the usual WiFi image with no appeal in it. The typography could have been more eye-catching and aligned. They should have used an appealing image to communicate this important information to the customers.

Arby’s Roost Burgers

Arby’s used sex appeal in this ad very effectively. They put emphasis on the image that shows the new burgers, Arby’s is introducing. The designer used active white space to give emphasis on this main content area. The ad looks balanced and unified. The designer also used contrast colors to make the ad visually appealing. Nevertheless, the design has a flow established in it, which controls the way the viewer’s eyes move across the ad.

Burger King also used sex appeal in some of their ads. However, they could not implement the strategy effectively. In this ad, the “mind-blowing” sandwich near the open mouth of a wide-eyed woman, accompanied by the suggestive tagline: “It’ll blow your mind away.” According to some advertising experts, this ad leaves little to the imagination and should be discontinued due to “distasteful” and unappetizing references to oral sex (Miller, 2009). The image could have been more appropriate. Nevertheless, the overall design of the ad is not as effective as well. The shadow effect coming from the burger looks artificial.

McDonald’s Sundial Billboard

McDonald’s sundial billboard was a very effective and innovative ad. It has the images of all the foods offered by Mcdonald’s during breakfast and lunch. The sun casts a shadow on each item that matches to the time of the day a customer would usually eat it. The numbers that are mentioned under each image represent the time when a customer feels the urge to eat that particular food. The design also consists some thin lines that are connecting the foods to the sun, which conveys the main message this ad wanted to deliver. The designer used proximity to make all these elements appear as one visual unit, which made the ad more balanced and unified.

A billboard should be very simple, yet informative. Sullivan (1996) advised not to put a lot of words in a billboard, since the audience pass the location very quickly. This billboard does not have heavy texts in it. The core message has been articulated very effectively by the images and the lines only.

As mentioned above, Burger King uses its typical mode of design in its ads. The billboards done by Burger King are no exceptions. It has a big picture of a burger and a lot of texts in it. The company should bring innovation in its billboard designs.

Wendy’s Logo

Wendy’s changed its logo in 2012. That year the company tried to re-brand itself. The new strategy was to attract millennials. Thus, the new logo has a girl’s image on it. The font that has been used to write ‘Wendy’s’ has its unique tone and expression. The color used in the logo, red, expresses boldness. The designer also used contrast colors. Using the color blue differentiated the new strategy that was intended to deliver by this logo.

In my opinion, Burger King did a good job with their logo. The logo emphasizes on the burger by the buns that sandwich the name of the restaurant. This actually conveys the message about the types of the products offered by Burger King, which means the logo has a clear strategy. Also, the logo is easily recognizable and has its own expression. The designer used three different colors and active white space to make it more effective and appealing.

KFC Mac and Cheese

KFC did a great job with its mac and cheese print ad. The designer implemented the movement strategy very effectively in the ad. The mac and cheese coming out from the packet points to the main message directly. He or she repeated the white colors in the texts to connect the dots. Also, the texts are properly aligned. The designer used contrast colors to make the objects of the ad more attractive and eye-catching.

The creative team of Burger King should design an ad using the movement concept. The design of the print ads could be more unified and the typography that they use in the ad should be more aligned. As mentioned above, the company could not bring any innovation in their print ads. It also has some major areas of improvement in its advertising.